Republicans Getting Behind Climate Change Solution

Each of our carbon footprints are critical for the survival of our planet.  I support all efforts to accomplish that.  However, I don't believe that effort will win without an economic incentive.  It is important that the true cost of carbon emissions be incorporated into our economy.  I've posted numerous times about how to do that with a carbon dividend or tax.   The Republican Party is responding to the impact the Democratic Party is having on this issue.  I believe a Green New Deal is just as important, but the Republican Party is coming out in favor of a carbon dividend to forestall the Green New Deal. 

The Republican Party’s position on climate change is rapidly evolving, with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) saying that we need conservative solutions and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) warning that the party ignores the issue at its own peril. Just Thursday, House Republican leadership, in its first policy conference of the year, presented a new climate strategy to GOP House members.

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The winning Republican climate answer is the third option: carbon pricing. Just as a market-based solution is the Republican policy of choice on most issues, so should it be on climate change. A well-designed carbon fee checks every box of conservative policy orthodoxy. Not surprisingly, this is the favored option of corporate America and economists — including all former Republican chairs of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers.

A coal-fired power plant in Glenrock, Wyo., in July 2018. (J. David Ake/AP)

Here in the State of Washington, we've tried twice to pass an Initiative for a carbon tax, but there was a problem.  British Columbia has successfully passed what is called a carbon dividend.  That is where the proceeds of the carbon fee is returned to the people in the form of a deduction on their taxes.  Unfortunately Washington has no income tax and so there wasn't a way to return the proceeds to the people as a deduction.  One Initiative listed some projects that would be funded, and second Initiatives proposed to set up commissions to use the proceeds, but the voters clearly didn't like the projects nor didn't trust that the commissions would make good decisions and in any event, the money wasn't coming back to them like it did in British Columbia.

But if there were a national carbon fee, there would be a way to reduce everyone's taxes proportional to the proceeds.  Here is what the Republican group headed by George Schultz plan to do:

We propose returning all the net revenue raised directly to the American people through equal quarterly checks. Under this model, the vast majority of American families would win financially. That makes carbon pricing quite popular: A poll by Luntz Global found that Americans in general support this carbon dividends concept by a 4-to-1 margin, and Republican voters under 40 by a 6-to-1 margin.

Republicans are strongly motivated:

Without an ambitious national climate plan, Republicans risk hemorrhaging younger voters who care disproportionately about climate change. The party has everything to gain from embracing the inherently conservative idea of carbon pricing as its own, immediately taking the high ground on a matter of increasing public concern.

The next issue will be how the carbon fee is applied.  There will no doubt be controversy.  Applying it to coal and oil will be easy, but harder will be to apply it to other products with large carbon footprints, like beef.  There will have to be a carbon fee on beef and it will result in much higher prices.  Hamburgers will become a luxury food.  That will be the next battle in the war against climate change.